Understand the telecommunications services and effectively manage the costs of those services. We explains in nontechnical language the most common telecom technologies and services in today’s marketplace. These services fall into four categories: local, long distance, data, and wireless services. Each service offering has its own unique type of bill.

Software Patching & Blade Servers

Software Patching

Server and desktop patching is a tradeoff between costs and benefits. Evaluate how you do patch management in your organization. Implementing effective patch processes helps improve security and systems management but also saves resources and reduces costs. There are many tools available to improve the efficiency and reduce costs of applying patches. For example, tools provide discovery and inventory information so you know what PCs and servers are using what software versions. Patch management requires accurate configuration information. Remote support tools provide automatic validation and delivery of patches that reduce patch and update time.

Blade Servers

For many years, companies have been implementing blade servers (e.g., IBM, HP, Rackable, Verari) to improve manageability and lower total cost of ownership. Advances continue in blade servers as they become more powerful, have a smaller footprint, have more power, and are cooling efficient. Using blade servers and server virtualization (covered earlier in this chapter), many companies are getting much more computing power for their money.